Virtue, whate'er the dazzled Vulgar dream,
Denies Phraätes, seated on thy throne,
Immortal Cyrus, Joy's internal gleam,
And thus she checks the Crowd's mistaken tone;
“He, only he, who, calmly passing by,
Not once shall turn the pure, unwishing eye
On heaps of massy gold, that near him glare,
My amaranthine wreath, my diadem shall wear.”
[1]: Penna metuente solvi must surely be allusive to the dissolving pinions of Icarus—and mean, that deeds of private generosity are apt to melt from the recollection of mankind; while those of what is called heroic exertion go down to Posterity. For this idea of the passage the Translator was indebted to a learned Friend.
TO THE HON. THOMAS ERSKINE.
HORACE, BOOK THE SECOND, ODE THE THIRD, IMITATED.
OCTOBER 1796.
Conscious the mortal stamp is on thy breast,
O, Erskine! still an equal mind maintain,
That wild Ambition ne'er may goad thy rest,
Nor Fortune's smile awake thy triumph vain,
Whether thro' toilsome tho' renowned years
'T is thine to trace the Law's perplexing maze,
Or win the SACRED SEALS, whose awful cares
To high decrees devote thy honor'd days.
Where silver'd Poplars with the stately Pines
Mix their thick branches in the summer sky,
And the cool stream, whose trembling surface shines,
Laboriously oblique, is hurrying by;
There let thy duteous Train the banquet bring,
In whose bright cups the liquid ruby flows,
As Life's warm season, on expanded wing,
Presents her too, too transitory rose;
While every Muse and Grace auspicious wait,
As erst thy Handmaids, when, with brow serene,
Gay thou didst rove where Buxton views elate
A golden Palace deck her savage scene[1].